eBooks Base 2000

He may disclaim all credit for
his performance, in the words of a nineteenth-century verse-writer:
This is the end of the book
Written by God.
I am the earth he took,
I am the rod,
The iron and wood which he struck
With his sounding rod.
[Footnote: L. E. Mitchell, _Written at the End of a Book._]
a statement that provokes wonder as to God's sensations at having such
amateurish works come out under his name. But this sort of humility is
really a protean manifestation of egotism, as is clear in the religious
states that bear resemblance to the poet's. This the Methodist
"experience meeting" abundantly illustrates, where endless loquacity is
considered justifiable, because the glory of one's experience is due,
not to one's self, but to the Almighty.
The minor American poets in the middle of the last century are often
found exhorting one another to humility, quite after the prayer-meeting
tradition. Bitter is their denunciation of the poet's arrogance:
A man that's proud--vile groveller in the dust,
Dependent on the mercy of his God
For every breath.


Pages:
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42